


Christmas In The Sewers (A Performance)

by King_Latifah



Category: Fantastic Mr. Fox
Genre: Christmas Music, Everyone's here really, F/M, I had to put in one 'Coconut Records' joke, M/M, more domestic bliss, this was supposed to be fluffier what happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 21:04:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5390321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/King_Latifah/pseuds/King_Latifah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Despite everything, he smiles, because they have finally found home. It's a little lackluster, a little smoky, but it'll do."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Christmas In The Sewers (A Performance)

**Author's Note:**

> My attempt at the fantastic foxes, my-crippling-Christmas-feels edition. Going into it, I meant it to be much happier, but I really have no power in this relationship. I suppose that's just what happens when you write fic at 4 AM whilst crying to Christmas music. Enjoy.

(Crackle.)  
(Crackle.)  
(Laughter.)  
(Whoosh.) 

Christmas in the sewers, understandably, is a bleak affair. 

While the pipes just overhead thunder with the sound of rushing water, a faux fireplace holds a few smoldering ashes, occasionally bursting into life with small flames that crackle and die out quickly. Badger blew it out of the unforgiving brick wall with TNT, a few weeks back. He said that a fireplace of this size could do them some good this winter, and though it fills their walkways with smoke, no one can argue against it. It keeps them warm, and they'd rather die of smoke inhalation than the cold. 

(This, at least, was the general consensus at their first-- and last-- public forum. Mr. Fox attended, just to see Badger try and control a crowd without a radio. He made fun of him in the column that week.) 

(Crackle.)  
(Whoosh.)  
(Ahem.) 

"H-hello?" Agnes' voice is so frail, Felicity says sometimes when she attends their practices. It is the voice of a young girl who has been breathing lots of smoke, and not seeing very much fire. "This is a test?" She taps the microphone twice, and the speakers shriek.

Mr. Fox, slumped in the bright-red easy chair next to the fire, gives her a thumbs-up of encouragement while everyone around him winces. His smile is meant to be reassuring, but ends up looking more intimidating than anything else. She grins back. A small cardboard sign set on Felicity's easel says 'Coconut Records' in Krisofferson's neat cursive. It was Ash's idea. They needed a band name, after all. 

(Crackle.)  
(Hello.) 

"Okay." 

Onstage is a motley crew of their children. Ash, whose voice is scratchy but surprisingly pleasant; Kristofferson, who has been compared to Bach on the piano; Agnes, with a fragile voice somewhat like a dove. Rabbit and Badger and Mole just wanted their kids onstage so that Foxy didn't get all the credit. They look profoundly lost up there, and he thinks it is funny. His smile is less scary than the last.

Rabbit's kid begins their song with an unholy screech on his violin, and shuts his eyes in mute, horrified concentration. His playing doesn't improve. 

Kristofferson then joins on the piano. Badger's child plucks the bass a couple times, and Mole's daughter clearly doesn't know what she's doing with the guitar in her arms. 

Agnes straightens her back a little and, when the time comes, she begins to sing. 

"Have yourself a merry little Christmas...." 

Felicity comes and stands by Mr. Fox's side. Her hand rests softly on his shoulder, and her eyes glisten. She has always been a sucker for Christmas music. 

"Let your heart be light....." 

Mr. Fox sips a little of his cider and moves up in his chair. Ash steps up to the microphone, all scraggly fur and unwashed towel-cape, and joins Agnes. 

"From now on, our troubles will be out of sight...." 

The smiles all around the room grow when they hear his voice. Coach Skip turns to Mr. and Mrs. Fox with his jaw dropped and mouths words to them that neither understands, gesturing wildly. They smile back in confusion. 

"Have yourself a merry little Christmas..." 

A Christmas light above them pops softly and fizzles out, spent. His attention is drawn to this light, this poor light that tried it's best. It died with grace, he thinks.

"Make the yuletide gay...." 

Felicity is humming along to the music, and so Mr. Fox joins her. Agnes shuts her eyes. Ash has his gaze fixed on a certain point on the opposite wall. He looks hilariously intense, Mr. Fox thinks, and chuckles a bit. 

"From now on, our troubles will be miles away..." 

It's so cold, Felicity observes sometimes, and he does his best to warm her up when she says this. His body has always been naturally warmer than hers, anyway. They usually end up dancing, stepping slowly here and there, their bodies pressed close to one another.

"Here we are, as in olden days, happy golden days of your..." 

He saw Ash and Kristofferson do it once, just once, after hearing a sinister crash coming from their room at precisely midnight. He never told a soul. He had never seen Ash so calm, so content, before. Felicity noticed his wet eyes that night when he returned. 

"Faithful friends who are dear to us, gather near to us once more...." 

They have the best food of the year cooking just a couple rooms away; There was talk of a Christmas turkey, sometime after the piteous fruit-bowl that was served at Thanksgiving. It was the highest morale they had seen in months.

"Through the years, we all will be together..." 

Ash smiles a bit when he sings this line. He almost looks like a different child, another visitor from across the river who wanted to see a refugee camp firsthand. He seems as though he is at peace.

"If the fates allow..." 

Despite everything, despite the mundanity of his new column, despite the hopelessness that they will ever see the sun again, despite the cold and the food and the children and the constant thundering of the water pipes just overhead, Mr. Fox smiles. It isn't a misleading smile, or the smile he sometimes gives when poking fun at someone in his head. 

"Hang a shining star upon the highest bough..." 

Despite everything, he smiles, because they have finally found home. It's a little lackluster, a little smoky, but it'll do. He is happy. 

"And have yourself a merry little Christmas now." 

There is an air of finality as Agnes steps away from the microphone. Ash continues to sing, just a little too long, and Kristofferson releases his foot from the piano's echo pedal just a little too quick, and there is a staccato burst of confused playing. Just listening to it is like falling off the bed in the morning. Mr. Fox gulps and resists the urge to grimace. 

The applause, for such a small audience, is uproarious. 

(Thank you.)  
(Thank you.)  
(Applause.)  
(Cheer.) 

(Crackle.)


End file.
